appreciating form, function, and pretty things

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Richards Hall…

…is a building I spend almost no time in. I know how to get to the cashiers office and the new Dean’s office for the College of Art and Design, or whatever its called. But now I can also get to the action lab, which is ridiculously hard to get to seeing as it requires secret stairs to get to the office. I was a guinea pig for a week which was fun. But the reason I’m mentioning it here is because I saw this:

It’s a mail chute! At some point, you would just stick your letter in that slot, it would fall down and be collected at the bottom. I don’t know if it is still used but I thought it was awesome. Considering it’s old and dirty, it is rather pretty and very useful if you still use snail mail. I like the minimal decoration. Today we’d just amke it plain stainless steel or something, but they added some simple decoration which is something lost today. Ornamentation seems to be either baroque ornate or completely minimal these days.

This, by the way, is the time of post I expect to make most often. I’m trying to notice things more. In many ways, this blog is more for me than anyone else. Occasional readers are just an added bonus!